Stallman on GCC, LLVM, and copyleft

Stallman on GCC, LLVM, and copyleft

Copyleft just ensures that derived work is free as well.

Yes, that's what I wrote.

but this in itself is a restriction so you cannot really argue that copyleft is free while non copyleft open source isn't (which actually allows the user to do more).

Yes, it has to be a restriction in order to guarantee something: the continued availability of the four freedoms for any future form of the code and for any recipient. Without that, the immediate recipient can enjoy the benefit of shipping a binary at the expense of the subsequent recipients who may then only get one or two of the freedoms. So much for user freedoms then!

(I'm not arguing that copyleft-licensing is the only way to release Free Software: that's a classic misportrayal of copyleft advocacy and isn't even a position of the FSF.)